A Battletech Christmas Carol
by sentinel28
Summary: A belated Christmas gift as the author, much like Kat, makes amends for forgetting about this story for a year. Oops. Anyway, read it and laugh  or maybe weep  as the infamous Katherine Steiner-Davion makes a complete 180!  Or...does she?
1. Ghosts, and I Don't Mean Bears

_**A Battletech Christmas Carol**_

_**Written With Savage Glee by Sentinel 28A**_

_AUTHOR'S NOTE: I actually wrote this some years ago for Lords of the Battlefield, but came across it while looking through some old saved fanfics. Needless to say, I wrote this before Katherine Steiner-Davion was deposed as Archon Princess in the FedCom Civil War, before Vlad essentially kidnapped her, or before the whole Jihad. Heck, it's even before _MechWarrior Dark Ages_ died off; I wrote it at a time when Dark Ages was still going strong. _

_So I decided, "What the heck, this is too good a story to moulder in the dark," so I did some reformatting, a few updates, and changed a few names around. Those of you who have reviewed my stories over the past several years—this one's for you._

_Oh, and don't try to make too much sense out of this. It's Katherine Steiner-Davion as Scrooge. It's not supposed to make any sense. Like Rumiko Takahashi once said to a fan who asked her if female Ranma could get pregnant: "I don't think about such things, and neither should you."_

_Since this story is complete…expect updates for the next few days on this story. Much like Scrooge had to get his three ghosts… _

* * *

PART I: GHOSTS, AND I DON'T MEAN BEARS

Ryan Steiner was dead, to begin with. There is no doubt whatsoever about that. The register of his burial was signed by the clergyman, the clerk, the undertaker, and the chief mourner. Katherine Steiner-Davion signed it, mainly because she was the Archon Princess and that was sort of her job. And Kat's name was good, at least at the time. But the point is, ol' Ryan was as dead as a doornail, dead as his father before him, dead as the Miami Dolphins' playoff hopes.

Kat knew he was dead? Of course she did. How could it be otherwise? Kat and he were partners, if not friends, for I don't know how many years. Kat was his sole executor, his sole administrator, his sole assign, his sole residuary legatee, his sole friend, his sole mourner.

(Well, okay--Ryan was married, and Free Skye mourned his death too. But the story doesn't work otherwise, so shut it.)

Oh, but she was a tight-fisted hand at the grindstone, was Kat Steiner-Davion! A squeezing, wrenching, grasping, scraping, clutching, covetous, beautiful, blonde sinner! (Which is why she was idolized by millions, kind of like Britney Spears.) External heat and cold had little influence on her. No warmth could warm, no cold could chill her. No wind that blew was bitterer than she. No falling snow was more intent upon her purpose, no pelting rain less open to entreaty. Foul weather didn't know where to have her. The heaviest rain and snow and hail and sleet and smog could boast of the advantage over her in only one respect: they often stopped coming down on people, whereas Kat never stopped goin--I mean, never stopped coming down on people. Hard. She was the Archon Princess, after all.

Nobody ever stopped her on the street to say, with gladsome looks, "My dear Archon Princess, how are you? When will you come see me?" This was probably because her Loki escorts would beat hell out of them. No beggars implored her to bestow a trifle, no children asked her what time it was, no man or woman ever once in all her life inquired the way to such and such a place, of Kat. Mainly because Loki would beat hell out of them, too. Even seeing eye dogs appeared to know her, and when they saw her coming on, would tug their owners into doorways and up courts, and then would wag their tails as though they said, "Woof," because this isn't a furry story and dogs don't talk, stupid.  
But what the heck did Kat care! She was a rich bitch; it was the very thing she liked. To edge her way along the crowded paths of life, warning all human sympathy to keep its distance, to look down on the teeming masses, was what the knowing ones call "kewl" to Kat. Any more rich and evil, and she would have had a part in _Titanic._ Or _Avatar._

So, anyway, once upon a time of all the good days in the year, upon a Christmas Eve, Kat sat busy in her throne room. It was cold, bleak, biting, foggy weather, and the city clocks outside the Triad had only just gone three, but it was quite dark already. Welcome to Tharkad, garden spot of the Lyran Alliance.

The throne room's doors were open, that she might keep her eye upon her sister and advisor, who, in a dismal little cell beyond, was copying ComStar dispatches. Kat had the thermostat turned down, but the thermostat was turned down even more in her sister's room, so much that her computer tended to fritz out at the extreme temperatures. But she couldn't change the thermostat, for Kat had the control in the throne room, which was guarded by BattleMechs. So surely as the advisor came in to change the thermostat, the Archon Princess predicted she (the advisor) would become a grease spot on the floor of the throne room, courtesy of one of the _Fafnirs_. Whereupon the sister put on her white comforter, and tried to warm herself with a Sunbeam laser pistol, in which effort she failed. In fact, the hole she put in the ceiling only made the cold worse.  
"A Merry Christmas, dear Katherine! God save you!" cried a cheerful voice. It was the voice of Phelan Kell, Kat's sort-of cousin and Khan of the Wolves-in-Exile, who came upon her so quickly that this was the first intimation Kat had of his approach.

"Bah!" said Kat, once she had peeled herself off the throne room ceiling. "Humbug!"

"Christmas a humbug, Katherine? You do not mean that, quiaff?"

"Aff! Out out, damn Merry Christmas spot! What's Christmas time to you but a time for paying bills without money, a time for finding yourself a year older and not an hour richer, a time for balancing the budget and having every item in them nitpicked by the Estates General! If I had my will, every idiot who goes about with 'Merry Christmas' on his lips should be boiled in his own pudding by PPCs and buried with a stake of holly through his heart."

"Damn, that is hard core!"

"Cousin, keep Christmas in your own way, and let me keep it in mine. Go conquer a planet or something."

"Keep it? But you do not keep it!" Phelan protested.

"Let me leave it alone, then. Much good may it do you--the Clans don't even celebrate Christmas anyway. Much good it has ever done you, except provide an excuse to attack!"

"There are many things from which I might have derived good," Phelan persisted, "by which I have not profited, I daresay, Christmas among the rest. But I am sure I have always thought of Christmas time, when it has come around--apart from the veneration due to its sacred origin, if anything belonging to it can be apart from that--as a good time; a kind, forgiving, charitable, pleasant time; the only time I know of, in the long calendar of the year, when men and women seem by one consent to open their shut-up hearts freely, and to thank people below them as if they really were fellow-travelers to the grave, and--"

Kat arched an eyebrow at him. "Would you please put down the book?"

"Yeah, but I have four more lines to go!"

"I know!"

"Well, in any case, cousin, though it has never put a scrap of gold or silver in my pocket, I believe it has done me good, and will do me good, and I say, God bless it!" Phelan slammed the book shut. "So there!" And he stuck out his tongue. The advisor in the other room applauded.

"Let me hear another sound from you," snapped Kat at the advisor, "and you'll keep your Christmas by being dropkicked by one of my _Fafnirs_!" Turning to Phelan, she added, "You're quite a powerful speaker, Khan Phelan. Too bad there's no politician caste in the Clans."

"Do not be bitchy, quiaff? Come on, dine with us tomorrow, or I will challenge you to a Circle of Equals!"

"Fine." Kat thrust her hand forward. "Paper."

"Rock. Dammit!" Phelan exclaimed. "Why will you not eat with us?"

"Why did you get married?"

"Because I fell in love and Ranna has a bumpin' booty."

"Because you fell in love!" Kat said mock-sweetly, as if that was the only thing in the world more ridiculous than a Merry Christmas. "Gad, you make me sick! Get out of my throne room!"

"Wait a second, you never came to see me before I tied the knot. Why give it as a reason now, quiaff?"

"Get out!"

"I want nothing from you; I ask nothing of you; why cannot we be friends, quiaff?"

"Because I hate your frigging guts and your quiaffs and the fact that you get to roll on the Clan Wolf tables and my forces don't! Get out!"  
Phelan half-bowed. "I am sorry, with all my heart, to find you so resolute. We have never had any quarrel, to which I have been a party."  
"A little thing called the Clan War slip your mind? Get out!"

"But I have made the trial in homage to Christmas," Phelan continued, not hearing her, "and I'll keep my Christmas humor to the last. So, a Merry Christmas, Your Overwhelmingly Highhandedness!"

Kat threw a shoe at him. "_GET OUT_!"

"And a Happy New Year!" Phelan shouted from the antechamber, and was gone before Kat could order her MechWarrior guards to open fire. The clerk, in letting Phelan out, had let two other people in. They were older gentlemen, pleasant to behold, and now stood, in respectful attention, in the throne room. They had books and papers in their hands, and bowed to her.  
"The Lyran Alliance's Archon, I believe," said one of the gentlemen, referring to his list. "Have I the pleasure of addressing Archon Katherine Steiner-Davion?"

"Duh," replied Kat derisively.

"At this festive season of the year, Your Highnessness," said the gentleman, taking up a PDA, "it is more than usually desireable that we should make some slight provision for the poor and destitute mercenaries of the Inner Sphere, who suffer greatly at the present time. Many thousands of MechWarriors are in want of common necessaries and common comforts, madame."

"Isn't there a war on somewhere, Colonel Canonizado?"

"Plenty of them," Bien Canonizado replied, "but they scarcely furnish Christian cheer of mind or body to the unoffending multitude. So, a few of us are endeavoring to raise a fund to buy the poor mercenaries some meat and drink, means of warmth, and new 'Mechs. We choose this time, because it is a time, of all others, when want is keenly felt, and abundance rejoicies. Plus everyone's a soft touch this time of year. What shall I put you down for?" He raised the stylus for his PDA.

"Zilch. Nada. Nothing!"

"You wish to be anonymous?"

"You wish to swab out a Heavy Gauss? I wish to be left alone. Since you ask me what I wish, gentlemen, that is my answer. I don't make merry myself at Christmas, and I can't afford to make idle mercs merry. I help to support them by starting wars--they cost enough--and those who are badly off need to go fight somebody."

"Many can't go there, and many would rather die," answered Canonizado.

"Good. Decrease the surplus population. Beat it." Kat pointed at the door.

* * *

Later, the hour of closing down the throne room for the day arrived. With an ill will, Kat, dismounting from her throne, tacitly admitted this fact to her expectant younger sister in the small room, who closed down her computer and put on her hat.

"You'll want all day tomorrow, I suppose?" Kat sighed.

"If it's convienent, Your Highness," the clerk replied.

"It is not convienent, and it's not fair. If I was to dock you 200 C-Bills for it, you'd think I'm a cheap bitch, right?"

"Yes, Your Highness."

"And yet you don't think I'm a cheap bitch when I pay a day's wages for no work at all."

"It's only once a year, Your Highness," pleaded Kat's younger sister.

"Hmpf. A poor excuse for picking my pocket every 25th of December. But I suppose you must have the whole day, or you'll run off and tell Victor and I'll have a civil war or something. Be here all the earlier next morning." The clerk promised that she would, and Kat walked out with a growl. The throne room was closed in a twinkling, and the younger sister, with the long ends of her white comforter dangling below her waist (for she boasted no uniform greatcoat), ran home as hard as she could, to see the rest of the family.

Kat took her low-cal, diet gruel in her usual low-cal, diet tavern, and having seen all the day's news tridees, and beguiled the rest of the evening with the Lyran Alliance's budget, went to her chambers to bed. She lived in chambers which had once belonged to her deceased mother. They were a gloomy suite of rooms. Nobody lived in this wing of the Triad but Kat, the other rooms being used as storage.

Now it is a fact, that there was nothing at all particular about Kat's knockers, except that they were very large and that Kat had seen them, night and morning, during her whole residence in that place. And yet Kat, having her key in the lock of the door, saw in the knockers, without their undergoing any intermediate process of change, not knockers, but Ryan Steiner's face. Ryan's face, with a dismal light about them in their twin reflections, like a bad lobster in the _Bebop_'s refrigerator. It was not angry or ferocious, but they looked at Kat as Ryan used to look, with ghostly rank upon their ghostly collars.

As Kat looked fixedly at these phenomenon, they were door knockers again. (What did you think I was talking about?) Kat said, "I need to quit drinking before noon," and closed the door with a bang. The sound resounded through the palace like thunder. Every room above and every storage box below appeared to have a separate peal of echoes of its own. Kat was not a woman to be frightened by echoes. She fastened the door, and walked across the hall, and up the stairs. She didn't care that it was dark, for darkness is cheap, and Kat liked it. Because she's evil and all.

But before she shut her heavy door, she walked through the rooms to see that all was right. She had just enough recollection of their faces on her knockers to do that. Sitting room, bedroom, game room: all as they should be. Nobody under the table, nobody under the sofa; a small fire in the fireplace, and a little saucepan of blood pudding on the counter. Nobody under the bed, nobody in the bed (dammit), nobody in the closet, nobody in her pajamas (that would be bizarre). Quite satisfied, she closed the door and locked herself in; double-locked herself in with a molecular key, which was not her custom. Thus secured against anything but rabid Elementals, she took off her clothes (yowza), put on her pajamas and slippers, and sat down before the very low fire to take her blood pudding. Because she's evil and all.

As she sat back in the chair, her glance happened to rest upon a bell, a disused bell, that hung in the room for some reason now forgotten. It was with great astonishment, and with a strange, inexplicable dread, that, as she looked, she saw this bell begin to swing. Soon it rang out loudly, and so did every bell in the palace wing--her tridee, her grandfather clock, her Hello Kitty chronometer.

This was succeeded by a clanking noise, deep down below, as if some person were dragging a heavy chain over the boxes in the storage rooms.  
Then she heard the noise much louder, on the floors below; then coming up the stairs; then coming straight towards the door. Kat knew she should call security, but she was too petrified. The clanking came on through the heavy door, and a spectre passed into the room before her eyes. And upon its coming in, the dying flame leapt up, as though it cried, "I know him! Ryan Steiner's ghost!" But it didn't--if dogs can't talk, fires damn sure can't.

The same face, the very same. Ryan Steiner in his Skye Rangers uniform. His body was transparent, so that Kat, looking through his uniform, could see the holdout pistols stuck in the belt behind. Kat had often heard it said that Ryan had no guts, but she hadn't believed it until now.  
Hell, she didn't believe it even now. Though she looked the phantom through and through, though she felt the chilling influence of its death cold eyes, and though she noticed the very large hole in the sides of his noggin, she was still incredulous.

"WTF?" said Kat, caustic and cold as ever. "What do you want with me?"

"Much!" It was Ryan's voice, no doubt about it.

"Who are you?"

"Ask me who I was."

Kat rolled her eyes. "Okay, who were you then?"

"In life, I was your partner in crime, Ryan Steiner."

"Can you--can you sit down?"

"I can."

"Well, do it then." Kat asked the question, because she didn't know whether a ghost so transparent might find himself in a condition to take a chair, and besides, it might be funny to see the ghost fall on its transparent ass. But the ghost sat down on the opposite side of the fireplace, as if quite used to it.

"You don't believe in me," the ghost said.

"Nope."

"What evidence would you have of my reality beyond that of your senses?"

"Say again?"

It was Ryan's turn to roll his eyes. As he picked them up off the floor, he said, "Why do you doubt your senses?"

"Because a little thing affects them. A slight disorder of the stomach makes them cheat. You may be an undigested bit of beef, a blot of mustard, a crumb of cheese, a fragment of an underdone potato. Either that, or the cooks are slipping LSD into my food." Kat was not much in the habit of cracking jokes, nor did she feel in her heart by any means humorous then. The truth is that she tried to be a smartass, as a means of distracting her own attention, and keeping down her horror. But how much greater was her horror when the phantom stuck its eyeballs in the holes the assassin's bullets had made, and made its head spin around on its neck a few times.

"Great suffering zot!" Kat cried. "Dreadful apparition, why do you trouble me? Why do spirits walk the earth--or Tharkad, I guess--and why do they come to me? And put your eyeballs back where they belong, have you lost your mind?"

Ryan put his eyes back where they were supposed to be, grinning at his little joke. "It is required of every man, that the spirit within him should walk abroad among his fellow men, and travel far and wide. If that spirit goes not forth in life, it is condemned to do so after death. Or something like that. I cannot tell you all I would. A very little more is permitted to me. I cannot rest, I cannot stay, I cannot linger anywhere. My spirit never walked beyond the borders of the Lyran Alliance in life, and weary journeys lie before me!"

"Two years dead. And traveling all the time. You must rack up the frequent jumper miles."

"You bet."

"So, you want to tell me where the Minnesota Tribe is?"

"Oh blind woman, blind woman! Not to know that any Christian spirit working kindly in its little sphere, whatever it may be, will find its mortal life too short for its vast means of usefulness. Not to know that no space of regret can make amends for one life's opportunities missed! Yet I was like this man, I once was like this man!" Ryan shrieked.

"Now you're starting to sound like Cobra Commander," Kat advised, "but you were always a good man of politics, Ryan."

"Politics!" cried the ghost, wringing its hands again. "Mankind was my politics. The common welfare was my politics! Charity, mercy, forbearance, benevolence, trade and sell, were all my politics! But I ignored all of it for politics!" This bothered Kat; she had been confident that, if she should die, she could take over hell. "Hear me!" Ryan exclaimed, "my time is nearly gone!"

"Okay, okay," Kat sighed. "I'm listening."

"I am here tonight to warn you that you have yet a chance and hope of escaping my fate. A chance and hope of my procuring, Katherine."

"Katrina."

"Whatever. You will be haunted by three spirits."

"That's the chance and hope you mentioned? That sucks!"

"Tough shit. Without their visits, you cannot hope to shun the path I tread. Expect the first this morning, when the chronometer tolls one AM. Expect the second an hour later. The third, at three. Look to see me no more, and look that, for you own sake, you remember what has passed between us!"

"You can't raise a ghost army like that guy in _Return of the King_, can you, because that would be so kewl?" Yet the ghost walked backwards from her, and at every step it took, the window raised itself a little, so that, when the apparition reached it, it was wide open. Then it disappeared. The ghost, not the window, silly.

Kat closed the window, and examined the door by which the ghost had entered. It was double-locked still, and the molecular coding was intact. "Humbug!" Kat tried to say, but stopped at the first syllable. And much in need of repose, she went straight to bed, and fell asleep on the instant, without undressing. Damn.


	2. The First Spirit, Not Vermouth

_AUTHOR'S NOTE: Chapter Two. Had to throw in some anime in here, since I haven't done any fanfic writing over in the _Inu-Yasha_ or _Evangelion_ boards in like, forever. Got to keep my hand in. _

* * *

CHAPTER TWO: THE FIRST OF THREE SPIRITS, NOT VERMOUTH

When Kat awoke, it was so dark that she could scarcely distinguish the transparent window from the opaque walls of her chamber, until suddenly the Triad clock tolled a deep, dull, hollow, melancholy, pants-soiling ONE.

Light flashed the room upon the instant, and the curtains of her bed were drawn aside by a strange figure, one that she recognized from anime. Like Kat herself, the figure's skin was pale, pale almost to the point of transparency, but unlike Kat's blonde hair, this woman's hair was bright green. Her eyes were green, young and old at the same time. She held not a branch of fresh green holly in her hand, but a neurohelmet of a much different design crooked in the hollow of her arm.

Kat blinked, rubbed her eyes, and blinked again. "Are you the spirit, ma'am, whose coming was foretold to me?"

"Yes," the regal woman replied.

"Who and what are you?"

"I am Miriya Parino, the Ghost of Battletech Past."

"Waaait a second. Miriya Parino was never part of Battletech, she was from Robotech!"

Miriya slapped her across the face. "Silence, dog! Harmony Gold won the lawsuit, so here I am."

Kat came up, angry. "Apparition or not, you just struck my royal face, and I'm going to--" She stopped. "I'm going to stay very still and try not to wet myself at this rather scary looking knife that just appeared at my throat."

"Smart. Don't mess with a Quadrono warrior.

"  
"Okay, okay--are you the Ghost of Battletech Long Past?"

"No, otherwise I would be Getter Robo. Your past, Katherine."

"Katrina."

"Whatever. The things that you see with me are shadows of the things that have been; they will have no idea we are there." Kat then made bold to inquire what business brought Parino there. "You are a blonde,"Miriya replied. "Your welfare, bimbo. Get up and follow me!"

It would have been in vain for Kat to plead that the weather and the hour were not adapted to pedestrian purposes; that bed was warm, the thermometer a long way below freezing, that she was clad but lightly in her slippers and pajamas, and that she was feeling surly. As usual. Miriya's knife and her willingness to use it, however, was not to be resisted. She rose, but finding that the spirit made towards the window, Kat clasped its purple flightsuit in supplication. "Wait a minute. As much as I hate to admit it, I'm only mortal, and it's a long way down."  
"Touch the heart of a Zentraedi warrior," said the spirit, "and you shall be upheld in more than this--over a bit, that is not the heart of a Zentraedi--there you go."

As the words were spoken, they passed through the wall, and stood in the busy streets of a city. It was made plain enough by the dressing of the shops that here, too, was Christmastime. Miriya stopped at a certain ornate door, and asked Kat if she knew it. "Know it?" Kat exclaimed. "This is New Avalon--the Davion royal hall!"

They went in. At the sight of an older man sitting behind a desk, Kat cried in great excitement, "Why, it's Dad! Good old Dad, alive again!"  
Hanse Davion laid down his pen, and looked up at the clock, which pointed to the hour of seven. He rubbed his hands, stood, laughed, and called out in a rich, jovial voice, "Hey there! Katherine! Peter!" A living and moving picture of Kat's former self, a young woman just shy of her teens, came briskly in, accompanied by her huge brother, who kept tripping over his own feet.

"Peter, my brother," said Kat to Miriya. "There he is, in all his klutzy glory. He was very much attached to me."

"Attached?" asked Miriya.

"Oh yes."

"And where is he now?"

"Search me. In some monastery or other. One of my advisors tried to get him to start another galactic war."

"Oh, is that all?" Miriya said imperiously, and smacked Kat upside the head, Gibbs-style. "Now shush."

"No more work tonight!? Hanse was saying. "Christmas Eve, Peter, Christmas Eve, Kat! Let's have the shutters up, before a man can say Jack Robinson!"

"Who says Jack Robinson anymore these days?" Peter asked.

Hanse smacked Peter upside the head, Gibbs-style. "Hush, son. I'm the Prince around here. Clear away, my children, and let's have lots of room here!"

"Dad," the young Kat pleaded, "we have armies of servants. Why not get them to?"

"Because work builds character," Hanse replied.

So they cleared away the various things in the throne room--furs, swords, paintings, 'Mechs, Michael Hasek-Davion's ashes--and it was done in a minute. Every movable was packed off, as if dismissed from public life evermore; the floor was swept and watered; the lightbulbs were changed to something more festive; fuel was heaped upon the fire (Peter thought avgas worked best); and soon the throne room was as snug, warm and dry, and as bright a ballroom as you would desire to see upon a winter's night. Yes, there was free beer and food, too.

In came a fiddler with a music book, and went up to the lofty dais of the throne, and made an orchestra of it, belting out _Cotton Eye Joe_. In came Melissa Steiner-Davion, one vast, beautiful smile. In came Victor, looking regal and dashing (Kat soured at the sight), and little Yvonne, beating her brother over the head with her plush fox, yelling "Pika! Pika!" at everyone until they laughed or hit her. In came all the young men and women employed in the palace. In came the housemaid, with her cousin the baker. In came the cook, with her brother's particular friend the milkman. (And no, particular has nothing to do with sexual persuasion. The milkman's just weird, okay?) In came Jaime Wolf, crashing the party as usual. In they all came one after another: some shyly, some boldly, some gracefully, some awkwardly, some pushing, some pulling, some slightly tipsy, some on their ass. Away they all went, twenty couples at once; hands half round and back again the other way, down the middle and up again; round and round in various stages of affectionate groping--er, grouping. Old Hanse, clapping his hands to stop the dance, cried out, "Well done!" and the fiddler knocked back a pint of porter and got progressively more stewed.

There were more dances, and there were forfeits, and more dances, and there was cake, and there was ice cream, and there was a great piece of cold roast, and there were pot pies, and there was ramen, and plenty of beer. But the great effect of the evening came after the roast and ramen, when the bombed fiddler struck up _Dragula_. Then old Hanse stood out to dance with Melissa. They had their work cut out for them with this traditional Christmas tune: three or four and twenty pair of partners, people who were not to be trifled with; people who would dance, and had no notion of walking. People that would kill other people over a rock they could plant the Federated Commonwealth's flag on. Damn straight.  
But if they had been twice as many, four times, old Hanse would have been a match for them and so would Melissa. As to her, she was worthy to be his partner in every sense of term. A positive light appeared to issue from Hanse's calves.

Wait a second. Hanse's _calves?_ Was Dickens high when he wrote this?

Anyway, they shone in every part of the dance. You couldn't have predicted, at any given time, what would become of them next. And when old Hanse and Melissa had gone all through the dance, Hanse cut, and cut so deftly, that he appeared to wink with his legs. Honestly, folks, I didn't make this part up.

When the clock struck eleven, this domestic ball broke up. Mr. and Mrs. Steiner-Davion took their stations, one on either side of the door, and, shaking hands with every person indivdually as he or she went out, wished him or her a Merry Christmas. When everybody had retired but the family, they did the same to them, and thus the cheerful voices died away and the children were left to their own beds and chambers, to think about all the loot they would get the next morning.

"I always wanted a stuffed Ein for Christmas," Kat remarked dreamily.

Miriya bitch-slapped her. "A small matter," said the spirit, "to make these silly nobles so full of gratitude and beer. Hanse has spent but a few pounds of your money--three or four billion C-Bills, perhaps. Is that so much that he deserves this praise?"

"It isn't that," said Kat heatedly, and speaking unconciously like her younger, not her older self, ?it isn?t that, spirit. He has the power to render us happy or unhappy, to make our lives light or burdensome, a pleasure or a toil. The happiness he gives is quite as great as if it cost some real money, not such a paltry sum.? She felt the spirit?s glance, and stopped.

"What?" Miriya asked. "Am I wearing my flightsuit backwards again?"

"No, nothing like that," Kat sighed.

"Hmm? Something?"

"No, no--I should like to be able to say a word or two to my youngest sister just now, that's all."

"War is hell and peacetime is even worse. Let's move on before the plot congeals." This was not addressed to Kat, or to anyone whom Kat could see, but it produced an immediate effect. For again, Kat saw herself. She was older now, a woman. Nor was she alone, but sat by the side of a handsome, scarred young man in a gray uniform, in whose eyes there were tears. They sat in a steel gray chamber, a transparisteel window looking out over a sea of stars.

"It does not matter, quiaff?" he said softly to Kat's former self. "To you, very little. Another idol has displaced me, and if it can comfort you in time to come, as I would have tried to do, I have no just cause to grieve."

"Vlad," the other Kat said, "I've known you for like two hours. What idol has displaced you?"

"A golden one. You fear your brother too much. I have seen your nobler aspirations fall off one by one, until the master passion, Greed, engrosses you, quiaff?"

"I had nobler aspirations? I came here to screw over my brother by making a peace treaty with his enemies. Have I ever said otherwise?"

"In words, no. Never," Vlad admitted.

"In what, then?"

"In a changed nature, in an altered spirit, in another atmosphere of life, another hope as its great end."

"I see Mike Stackpole is writing you again."

Vlad pretended not to hear the other Kat. "If you were free today, tomorrow, yesterday, can even I believe that you would choose a poor, Clan warrior Khan, or, choosing him, do I not know that your repentance and regret would surely follow? I do, and I release you back to your realm. With a full heart, for the love of her you once were." Vlad threw the book over his shoulder. "Well, enough of the hearts and flowers surat crap. Let's get naked."

"Spirit!" the present Kat cried. "Remove me from this place!"

"Why?" Miriya asked. "It's getting pretty good."

"Please, spirit! I beg of you."

"I told you these were shadows of the things that have been," said Miriya Parino. "That they are what they are, do not blame me!"  
"Get me out of here!" Kat exclaimed. "I can't bear it! Leave me! Take me back! Haunt me no longer!"

"As you wish." Miriya head-butted her, and Kat, overcome by an irresistible drowsiness and sudden headache, and further of being in her own bedroom. She had barely time to reel to bed before she sank into a heavy sleep.


	3. The Second Spirit, Not Gin

_AUTHOR'S NOTE: Whoops, took a bit longer to post this than I thought. Think of it as a late Christmas present, or something._

_Also, be careful you don't fall in the plot hole. Oh well; this isn't supposed to be remotely serious anyway. But damn, was it fun to write…_

_I'd have a reviewer's corner, but there's only like two more chapters of this thing, and the reviews I've been getting are readers essentially spotting themselves with laughter. Which is EXACTLY what I want, so keep up the mirth, folks._

* * *

PART III: THE SECOND OF THREE SPIRITS, AND I DON'T MEAN GIN

Kat awoke in her bedroom. No doubt about that, but it, and the adjoining sitting room, into which she shuffled Rei-like in her slippers, had undergone a surprising transformation. The walls and ceiling were so hung with living green stuff that it looked like a greenhouse. The leaves of holly, mistletoe, and ivy reflected back the light, and such a mighty blaze roared in the chimney that it would classify as a Class II atrocity under the Ares Conventions. Heaped upon the floor, to form a kind of throne, were turkeys, geese, game, great joints of meat, long wreaths of sausages, mince pies, pudding, red-hots, apples, juicy oranges, luscious pears, and great bowls of punch. Mmmm. Makes you hungry, neh?  
Sitting easy upon this couch there sat a warrior dressed all in Jade Falcon green, but brighter and richer than the standard uniform of the Green Chickens. He bore a glowing flashlight, in a shape not unlike the horn of cornucopia, and pointed it to shed its light on Kat, as she came peering around the door.

"Come in, quiaff? I am the Ghost of Christmas Present. Look upon me, quiaff? You have never seen the like of me before!"

"Yes I have," Kat said flatly.

"You have?" the spirit asked.

"Sure. You're Aidan Pryde, and if I hadn't already figured out this was some sort of sorcery by all the food, you being here would be a big clue. After all, weren't you killed on Tukayyid?"

Pryde shrugged. "Depends. According to Thurston, yes. According to J.A. Baker, then no. Either way, it does not matter, quiaff?"

Kat aped Pryde's shrug. "I suppose. What's with all the food? I thought you Clanners were pretty spartan."

"Aff, but I am making up in the afterlife what I lacked in life. Want some cake?"

"No, that's okay. Take me where you will and get it over with. I went out earlier on compulsion, and I supposed I learned my lession. If you're here to teach me more than how to gain weight and get drunk, then let's get to it."

"Aff. Touch my uniform." Kat did as she was told, and held it fast. "Not so tightly, quiaff? I bruise like a grape."

The room and its contents vanished instantly, and they stood in the frozen streets of Tharkad upon a snowy Christmas morning. Kat and the Ghost passed on, invisible, straight to the domicile of Kat's brother, Victor. "What the hell—" Kat began indignantly.

"Hush," Pryde ordered, and Kat shut up. They drifted as if nothing through the front door of Victor's quiet home just inside the Triad walls, where Kat had exiled her brother. Inside, a young, quite beautiful Japanese woman, dressed poorly in a twice-turned gown, wearing ribbons that were cheap but looked good for a few measly pfennings, laid down a cloth. Peter Steiner-Davion, a giant dressed in a uniform too small for him, plunged a fork into a saucepan of potatoes. He blew the fire, until the slow potatoes, bubbling up, knocked loudly at the lid in a boil.

"What has ever got your precious brother then?" asked Omi Kurita in her trimmed and very proper English. "And your sister Yvonne! And Kai was not as late last Christmas by half an hour!"

"I'm here, friend Omi!" said a young Asian man, as the door opened.

"He's here, Omi," echoed Peter. "You won't believe how our goose is cooked this year, Kai!"

"_So ka_, so it is," Omi said, kissing Kai's rosy cheeks and taking off his rude shawl and coat for him.

"We had a deal of work to finish up last night at Free Capella," replied Kai.

"_Shigata ga nai_," Omi replied. "Never mind so long as you are here. Sit yourself before the fire and get warm."

"Here comes Victor," cried Peter. "Hide, Kai, hide!" So Kai hid himself for some damn reason, and in came Victor Steiner-Davion, now wearing the white comforter that Yvonne had wrapped herself in, and his threadbare uniform done up and brushed to look seasonable, and Yvonne riding on his back, the better to cover the monumental plot hole the author now found himself in.

"Hey, where's Kai?" asked Victor, looking around. "I saw him come in. Don't tell me he's suddenly developed Phantom 'Mech or something else munchy—"

"He is not coming," said Omi.

"Not coming!" exclaimed Victor, with a sudden lowering of his spirits, for he had been carrying Yvonne home all the way from church, and had hoped to see his friend again. "He's not coming on Christmas?"

Kai hated to see him disappointed, even in a lame ass joke, so he came out from behind the closet door, while Peter hustled off Yvonne to show her the Jello in the freezer.

"And how is Yvonne?" asked Omi, as Victor and Kai slapped each other on the back and called each other foul names, as men are wont to do upon meeting.

"Fine," said Victor, "and feeling better. She was so sick yesterday that I feared for her walking home through the snow." Victor's voice trembled at this. Yvonne sniffled and tried to look interested as Peter showed her the pudding, but it was obvious she was in great distress. Victor, turning up his cuffs—as if they were capable of being made more shabby—compounded some hot mixture in a jug with bathtub gin and lemons, stirring it with a spoon and then putting it on the stove to cook the impurities out of it. He threw the charred remains of the spoon in the trash as Peter went to fetch the goose, with which he soon returned in high spirits.

Omi made the gravy, pouring in a generous amount of sake (in the gravy, not herself); Peter mashed the potatoes like a _Daishi_ among infantry; Kai sweetened up the applesauce and dusted the hot plates; Victor took Yvonne beside him as they set the table. At last they sat down, the dishes were set on, and grace was said. It was succeeded by breathless pause as Omi, looking slowly all along the katana, prepared to plunge it into the breast of the goose; one murmur of delight arose all around the table, and even Yvonne, looking like the fourth day of a three day pass, beat on the table with the handle of her knife, feebly crying out for Omi to quit imploring the name of the moon and just stab the damn thing already.

There never was such a goose. Victor said he didn't believe there ever was such a goose cooked. Its tenderness and flavor, size and cheapness, were the themes of universal admiration. Eked out by apple sauce and smashed potatoes, it was sufficient dinner for the whole group. After the last atom of the goose had been ravenously devoured with all the table manners of Henry VIII and Attila, Omi left the room alone to get the Jello out of the freezer in the back, and bring it in.

Suppose it should not be done enough, they thought aloud. Suppose it should break in turning out! Suppose somebody should have got over the wall, past the Lohengrin guards, past the 1st and 2nd Royal Guards, past Curiatis, past Tiaret the hulking Elemental standing out front, and stolen the Jello, while they were ripping into the goose's entrails! All sorts of horrors were supposed. But wait! They watched it quiver, they watched it shiver, and at last, Omi entered, flushed but smiling proudly, with the Jello, like a speckled Gauss round, blazing in half a tureen of ignited brandy, and with a sprig of Christmas holly stuck to the top.

Oh, a wonderful Jello, Victor said, and calmly too, that he regarded it as the greatest success in the kitchen achieved by Omi Kurita since Stackpole finally said the hell with it and let them do the horizontal tango. Omi said that, now that the weight was off her mind, she would confess she had had her doubts about the quantity of Jello mix. Everybody had something to say about it—namely about putting out the brandy before they set the place on fire—but nobody said or thought it was at all an awfully small amount of Jello for such a large gathering. Any of them would have blushed to hint at such a thing.

At last the dinner was done, the cloth cleared, the hearth swept, and the gas thrown on the fire. The compound in the jug was tasted, and after Victor peeled himself off the floor and declared the contents perfect, apples and oranges were put upon the table, and some nut put on the fire. After Kai pulled Peter out of the fireplace, chestnuts were put on instead. Then the group drew around the hearth, in what Victor called a circle (duh!) and at Victor's elbow stood the family display of glassware—two tumblers they had stolen from the Cobalt Coil, a couple of cracked coffee mugs with ribald sayings such as "MECHWARRIORS DO IT IN THE COCKPIT" and "THE REVENANTS GET OURS AT NIGHT," and a Tupperware cup without a handle. These held the hot stuff from the jug, however, as well as golden goblets would have done, and Victor served it out with beaming looks. The Tupperware dissolved, but Victor proposed in any case, "A Merry Christmas to us all, my dears. God bless us!" Which all the family echoed; "God bless us every one," said Yvonne, the last of all.

"Wait just a damn second," Kat asked the Ghost, "each one of us in this room, with the exception of you, Aidan Pryde, has enough money to buy and sell small planets. You're trying to get me to believe that they're poor and broke? I was born at night, but I wasn't born last night, spirit."

"Would you believe the ATM broke?" Pryde asked sheepishly.

"No."

"Would you believe that the check didn't clear?"

"No."

"Would you believe that this is a literary device intended solely to make you look like a royal heel?"

Kat brightened. "Okay, I'll buy that." She whirled back to the proceedings on hearing her own name.

"To Katherine Steiner-Davion," said Yvonne, "the Founder of the Feast here at the Triad!"

"The founder of the feast, the Dragon's butt," cried Omi. "I wish I had her here. I'd give her a piece of my katana to feast upon, and hope she'd have a good appetite for it."

"Whoa, that's harsh," Yvonne coughed.

"It should be Christmas day, neh," said Omi, "on which one drinks the health of such a odious, stingy, hard, cold, icy, unfeeling, glacial, thick as a brick, slut puppy, bitch queen of the universe as Katherine. You know she is, Yvonne! Nobody knows it better than you, you poor dear."

"But it's Christmas," was Yvonne's mild answer.

"I'll drink her health for your sake and the day's," said Omi, "and not for hers. A Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! And may Kat's life be long and interesting!" They drank the toast, but the mere mention of Kat's baleful name was enough to cast a shadow on the events of the day.

"I'm not that bad," Kat said, shifting her feet.

"Do you not visit message boards?" Pryde asked. "Enough of this scene then, quiaff? Let us be off to a party more to my liking, even if they are Wolves…"

* * *

It was a great surprise to Kat, as this scene vanished, to hear a hearty laugh. It was a much greater surprise to Kat to recognize it as her own cousin's, and to find herself in a bright, dry, gleaming 'Mech bay, with the Ghost standing, smiliing, by her side, and looking at Phelan Kell. It is a fair, even handed adjustment of things, that while there is infection in disease and sorrow, there is nothing in the world so irresistibly contagious as laughter and good humor. When Phelan laughed, Ranna Kerensky laughed as heartily as he. And the rest of the assembled Wolves in Exile, being not a bit behind and knowing which side of bread the butter was on, laughed out lustily.

"She said that Christmas was a humbug," exclaimed Phelan. "She believed it too!"

"We should kill her!" Ranna insisted. "She has insulted the Wolf Clan's honor!" She was very pretty, with a dimpled, beautiful face, a mouth that seemed made to be kissed (as no doubt it was), and the sunniest pair of eyes one ever saw in any creature's head. Altogether she was what one would have called provoking but satisfactory, perfectly satisfactory. When she wasn't screaming for the imminent violent death of another living being, anyway.

"She's a comical old bitch," said Phelan, "and that's truth, and she's a lousy conversationalist besides. However, her offenses carry their own punishment, and I have nothing to say against her. Who suffers by her ill whims? Herself, always."

"And half the Battletech universe," Ranna grumped. "If you will not let us kill, at least you could let us maim." With that, another hearty laugh came from the Wolves.

"So she takes it into her empty head to dislike us, and she will not come and dine with us. What's the consequence? She does not lose much of a dinner, quiaff?"

"Aff, I think she loses a very good dinner," replied Ranna. "But I still think we should maim her."

"Gee, maybe I have been a little harsh, if even the Clanfolk don't like me," Kat mused, her fingers massaging her neck, where she could almost feel a Elemental's fingers. "What say you, Aidan—" But the spirit was gone, as suddenly Kat stood in an open place, and the bell struck three. As the last stroke of the bell ceased to vibrate, she remembered the prediction of old Ryan Steiner, and, lifting up her eyes, beheld a solemn Phantom, draped and hooded, coming out of the mist along the ground before her.

"Oh shit," said Kat.


	4. The Third Spirit, Thank Mother Gaia

_AUTHOR'S NOTE: Great. Now I'm forgetting to post chapters. Getting old stinks. Anyhow, the last of the ghosts, with just the aftermath after this. A tip of the hat to Rogue, who gave me the idea for the Ghost of Christmas Future. And a big bow to all of you who have reviewed my stories over the years, because this chapter is especially for you._

_The reference to the perky Goth, by the way, is Gilly from _Dork Tower._ That was originally who the Ghost was going to be, but I got a better idea._

* * *

CHAPTER FOUR: THE LAST OF THE SPIRITS, THANK MOTHER GAIA

The Phantom slowly, gravely, silently approached. When it came near her, Kat resisted the urge to wet her jammies and managed to stay her ground, for the way this spirit moved, it seemed to scatter gloom and mystery. It was shrouded in a deep black garment, which concealed its head, its face, its form, and left nothing visible save one outstretched hand, which was that of a skeleton's. Kat knew no more, for the spirit neither spoke nor moved.

"You're the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come, right?" Kat asked. "Ghost of the future! You're scarier than the others I've seen—but as I know your purpose is to do me good, and as I hope to be less a bitch than what I was, I am prepared to bear you company and gladly so." The spirit remained silent, so Kat swallowed and said, "Will you not speak to me?"

"No," the spirit replied. The hand remained pointed straight before them.

"Oh. Well, lead on, then—waaait a minute," Kat stopped. "You just spoke."

"No, I didn't," the spirit replied.

"Yes, you did." Kat detected a femininty to the voice. "So who are you? My offspring? Yvonne's?" Kat rolled her eyes. "Or perhaps Victor and Omi's?"

"Nope." The specter stood a little closer to the waning moonlight—close enough that Kat could see that the face was not bony and skeletal, but that of a teenage girl, with long black hair framing a fairly attractive, though very pale face.

"Oh, _NO_!" Kat screamed. "The future is horrible! It's Abby from _NCIS!_"

The spirit smacked her with the bony hand. "Dammit! I'm no Goth, perky or otherwise. I'm Allegra."

"You're who?"

"I'm a temp. This guy Devlin Stone was supposed to be your Ghost of Christmas Future, but he took off and nobody knows where he is, so I got called in. On Christmas Eve, too. I'm one of the author's creations from…from another game system, let's just put it at that." Allegra threw the fake hand over her shoulder. "Now come on, let's look at your future. I don't got all night."

"Very well," Kat huffed. "Lead on." _I'm following a not-so-perky goth refugee from some other game system, _she thought_. Talk about serving penance. Next thing you know, someone's going to show up in a red plugsuit or something. _

They scarcely seemed to enter the city, for it seemed to spring up around them. Yet they were in the heart of Tharkad City, of that there was no doubt, in the mercantile quarter. They stopped beside one little knot of people. Allegra motioned to the men, and Kat advanced to eavesdrop on them.

"No," said a man dressed in quasi-military fatigues, with an older pattern helmet on his head. "I don't know about it either way."

"Mmrf rmf fe fie?" inquired another.

The first man tore off the black hood the man wore. "Must you always wear those ninja jammies, Wylder? You look like Shirt Ninja or something."

"Bite me, Rogue. When did the old bat die?"

"Last night, I think."

"What was the matter with her? I thought she'd never die."

"Who knows?" said Wylder with a yawn.

"What has she done with her money?" asked a tall gentleman with a beard.

"I haven't heard, Mosin," said Wylder. "Company, maybe. She didn't leave it to me. That's all I know."

Kat was at first inclined to be surprised that the spirit should attach importance to conversation apparently so trivial, temp or not, but decided that it must have some hidden purpose. She wondered what it was; it could scarcely be supposed to have any bearing on the death of Ryan Steiner, for that twas the Past, and this Ghost's province was the Future, twasn't it. She looked for a picture of herself in the customary area where the Archon's portrait usually hung, but there was nothing there. Kat wondered if that was good or bad.

They went to a shop that bore the title Iron Wind Metals. Hunks of lead, pewter, ralidium, and old scrap iron were lying about.

A woman with a heavy bundle slunk into the shop. She had scarcely entered when a man, dressed in red and similarly laden, came in too, closely followed by another. After a short period of blank astonishment of staring at each other, all four of them burst into laughter.

"Let me be first!" cried she who had entered first. "SulliMike can be second, and Noveltigger third! Look here, old Wylder, here's a chance at some loot! If we haven't all three met here without meaning it!"

"You couldn't have met in a better place, Commander Arla-Vlata," Wylder replied. "What have you got to sell? What have you got to sell?"

"Hold on to your britches a minute, Wylder, and I'll show you." Sheila Arla-Vlata opened her pack and showed its contents to the assembled men.

Kat could not see in the bag.

"That's hot stuff," SulliMike said. "A mint Battledroids _Behemoth_! Won't they miss that?"

"Nah," Arla-Vlata replied. "Every person has a right to take care of themselves. She always did! Who's the worse for the loss of a few things like these? Not some dead chick, I suppose. If she wanted to keep 'em after she was dead, the wicked old bitch, why wasn't she good in her lifetime? If she had been, she'd have somebody to look after her when she was struck down, instead of lying gasping out her last there, alone by herself. Not even a royal no more."

"Truer words were never spoke," said Noveltigger. "It's a judgement on her."

"Yeah, well—I wish it was a little heavier of a judgement. It damn well should have been. Dig through that, old Wylder, and let me know what let's worth, and be straight up about it. I'm not afraid to be first, nor afraid for these other thieves to see it."

Wylder went down on his knees for the greater convenience of opening the bundle, and dragged out a large and heavy roll of some dark fabric.

"What's this? Bed curtains?"

"Sailor Moon bed curtains," Arla-Vlata smirked.

"And her blankets?"

"Who else would have access to the ancient lore of the Powerpuff Girls? Anyway, she isn't likely to get a cold without 'em." She slapped Baron's hand. "Hey, hands off, Rogue. That's a girl's blouse."

"Well, duh," Baron snapped back. "I was getting it for _my_ characters!"

"You might as well then," Arla-Vlata sighed. "You won't find a hole in it, nor even a threadbare place. It's the best one she had, and fine silk too, all the way from Sian. They'd have wasted it by dressing her up in it, if it hadn't been for me."

Kat's face had taken on a look of horror. She looked to Allegra. "Who died?"

Allegra shrugged. "Beats me. I just go where the plot pulls me."

"Oh, wait, I see," Kat said. "The case of this unhappy woman might be my own—yes, that's what they think of me in the lower classes, now. Point taken. Can we move on?"

Allegra pulled out a scroll, and pondered it. "Sure." And she conducted Kat to her brother Victor's house, the dwelling Kat had visited not more than an hour before, and found Peter Steiner-Davion seated near the fire, a middle-aged woman with graying black hair sitting beside him. It was quite a contrast with before—all were very quiet. Peter had a book before him, and was reading it. "'And there was great rejoicing.'"

The woman had been knitting, and suddenly set her work upon the small table, brushing at her eyes. "Not tonight, Peter. This color hurts my eyes." She reached over and put on a pair of reading glasses. "That's better." For the first time, Kat noticed that her younger brother looked older than before, and that this woman was not Omi Kurita. "My eyes are weak in this dim light, and I wouldn't show dim eyes to my husband when he comes home. It must be near time."

"Past time, Isis," Peter answered, shutting the book. "I think he's walked a little slower than he used to."

"He used to walk fast, even with—" The woman hesitated. "Even with Yvonne."

"Me too," Peter said sadly. "Often enough."

"But she was light--" The woman stood suddenly. "Oh, there's Victor."

"Isis?" Kat asked Allegra. "Isis Marik? Damn, my brother does get around. It _is_ Isis, isn't it?"

"How should I know?" Allegra shrugged. "This isn't even my game world."

Isis had hurried out, and Victor soon came into the room, wearing Yvonne's comforter. His tea was ready for him on the stove, and they all tried to help him get to it first. Victor was looking more like their father, Kat noted. He was very cheerful with them, and spoke pleasantly, but Kat suspected it was forced cheer. He praised the industry and speed of Isis—it would be done long before Sunday, he said.

"Sunday!" Isis exclaimed. "You went today then, Victor?"

"Yes," Victor replied. "I wish you could have gone. It's a beautiful place—all green. Well, I guess—I guess you'll see it often enough. I promised her that I would walk there on a Sunday." He suddenly broke down and began sobbing. "My little sister, my poor little sister!"

Kat sniffled. "Not Yvonne? Oh, no, not Yvonne! What have I done!" She wiped at her eyes. "I must become someone less bitchy in the future, right? There must have been something I could have done!" Allegra only shrugged again. "Allegra," Kat said, "something tells me our parting moment is at hand. I know it, but I know not how."

"Roc page limit," Allegra replied.

"Please, show me my sister's grave, and tell me who it was that the other men were discussing—the men in the mercantile district and those at IWM."

"You got it," Allegra said, and the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come (Temp) conveyed her to a dismal, wretched, ruinous churchyard, under a sky lit by a blood red moon. "This doesn't look green," Kat said. "This doesn't even look like Tharkad."

"It isn't," Allegra answered, standing among the graves, and pointed down to one. Its headstone was of a 'Mech, broken and weathered with age and pitted with disuse.

"Before I look, answer me one question," Kat asked.

"Make it quick. I'm hungry."

"Are these the shadows of the things that will be, or the shadows of the things that may be?"

Allegra shrugged once more. Kat was gathering that she wasn't much of a conversationalist. She just continued pointing at the 'Mech headstone.  
Kat crept towards it, trembling as she went, and, following the finger, read upon the stone of the neglected grave her own name: HERE LIES KATHERINE STEINER-DAVION. LONG MAY SHE ROT.

"No…" Kat exclaimed. "No! It can't be! It's not possible!"

"Search your feelings," Allegra snarled. "You know it to be true." She spread her arms wide. The whistle of the wind billowed her cloak outwards, blowing away the snow. Her fingers grew clawlike, and Kat's eyes widened to see the flash of fangs as the specter grinned horribly. The claws once more pointed down. Kat, almost petrified with fear, looked down as a reddish black fog seemed to close in around them.

They and the grave now rested on a polished black circle, with white numbers and symbols burned into it, glowing hellishly in the dim light. Kat staggered back, her mouth opened in a soundless scream, only to stumble over a raised portion of the disk. She fell and looked down at the dial that lay before her. "Oh, no! No, spirit! Oh no, no! Not…_CLICK TECH!"_

She whirled to face Allegra, who was laughing uproariously, her fangs shining in the red light. "Please, spirit! I am not the woman I was! I will not be the woman I must have been but for this! Why show me this, if we are past all hope? Assure me that I yet may change these shadows you have shown me by an altered life!" She clasped her hands to the specter in supplication. "I will honor Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year. I'll live in the Past, the Present, and the Future! I won't complain about Dark Ages anymore! I won't even gripe about munchy Clantech! The spirits of all three Ghosts shall strive within me—I've learned my lesson, really! Tell me, Allegra, that I may erase the writing on this headstone!"

Allegra only grinned evilly. "Like I care what you do. White Wolf's my temp agency, not Catalyst." She licked her bloodless lips. "And like I said, I'm hungry." She stepped forward and seized Kat by the front of the shirt. "Get ready to take twenty clicks of damage, Katherine Steiner-Davion!"  
Kat screamed and beat futilely against the girl who held her fast. But no sharp pain of fangs in her throat came. Instead, Allegra's hood and dress seemed to shrink, collapse, and dwindle down into a pillow.

Kat found herself hitting Pikachu—her Pikachu pillow. The bed was her own as well, as was the room. Best of all, the time before her was her own, to make amends in.


	5. Great Suffering Zot, It's Christmas!

_AUTHOR'S NOTE: I was glancing through my stories after posting the last chapter of _A Matter of Justice,_ and realized I'd never posted the last chapter of this! So here it is. Sorry about the delay._

PART V: HOLY SUFFERING ZOT, IT'S CHRISTMAS

Kat was checked in her paeans of thanks by the churches of Tharkad ringing out the lustiest peals she had ever heard. Running to the window, she opened it, and put out her head. No fog, no mist, no night: a clear, bright, stirring, golden day.

"What's today?" cried Kat, calling downward to the Lohengrin guardsman at her front door.

"Huh?" said the guardsman, wakened out of doping off.

"What's today, my fine fellow?"

"Today?" _Geez_, thought the guardsman, _she's been drinking more than usual_. "It's Christmas day, Your Highness."

"It's Christmas Day!" Kat did a brief fibble-fobble dance. "I haven't missed it! Hey, my fine fellow!"

"Er…hi, Your Highness!"

"Do you know the poulterer's, in the street outside the main gate, at the corner?"

"Uh, yeah!"

"Intelligent guard…remarkable man…" Kat mumbled to herself happily. "Do you know whether they've sold the prize pterodactyl that was hanging up there? Not the little one—the big ass one!"

"What, the one that looks like you'd need an Arrow IV to bring it down?"

"What a delightful guy…pleasure to talk to him…yes, my friend!"

"Sure, I guess it's still there." _Gad, the old lady's cracked_, the guard thought.

"Is it? Go and buy it!"

"Say what? I don't make enough in a month to buy a wing off that monster—I'm only a corporal!"

"Tell them that the Archon has need of it, and tell 'em to bring it here, that I may give them the direction where to take it. Come back with the poulterer, and I'll promote you to sergeant. Come back with him in less than ten minutes, and I'll make you an officer!"

"Yes, ma'am!" _Hot damn_, the guard thought, rubbing his hands together, _whatever she's drinking, I'm getting some more for her_. He was off like a scalded dog.

"I'll send it to my brother!" Kat cackled. "He won't know who's sending it. It's twice the size of Yvonne! Ha! This is gonna be great!"

The hand in which she wrote the address was not a steady one, but write it she did, somehow, and went downstairs to open the street door, ready for the poulterer to show up.

Great Gaia, it was a pterodactyl! It took an APC to bring it to her front door, and it looked like it could make a healthy meal of a 'Mech. Kat dressed herself in all her best, which was a disappointment to the guardsman, since she had been leaning out of her window in a tiny negilgee, and it was a cold morning, point, point. The people were by this time pouring out of their houses like the Clans were invading, and walking with her hands behind her, Kat regarded everyone with a goofy smile. She looked so irresistibly pleasant, that three or four good-humored fellows said, "Good morning, Your Highness! A Merry Christmas to you!" Everyone else shrank back, because Kat, like Stalin, was considered the most dangerous when she was in a good mood.

* * *

In the afternoon, she turned her steps towards the Wolves' hall. She passed the door a dozen times before she had the courage to go up and knock. This freaked out the Elemental guards, who were about to open fire and ask questions at some point, but they held their fire and she did it. A giant female Elemental with the nametape FETLADRAL answered the door, three times Kat's size. "Ah, hello!" Kat said cheerily. "Is your master at home, my dear?"

"Who in the stravag hell are you calling my master? No one is my master! I am Evantha Fetladral, Elemental Star Colonel—"

"I'm terribly sorry. I meant if your Khan is in."

"Oh. Well, aff."

"Wonderful giant woman! Where is he, prithee?"

_What is wrong with this freebirth freak_? Evantha wondered silently. "He is in the dining hall, with his lifemate."

"He knows me," said Kat, brushing aside the amazon and walking into the dining hall. "I'll just go on in—ah, hello, Phelan!"

Phelan was busy feeding Ranna a Christmas cake. So surprised was he by the sound of Kat's voice that he smeared the cake all over Ranna's face. "What are you doing here?"

"I've come to dinner. Will you still have me?"

Phelan looked curiously at the cider Ranna had served, then shrugged and said, "Sure, I suppose so."

If there's anything the Wolves know how to do, it's party. And though they were quick to forgive Kat her insults, because of the change of heart she had, that didn't mean they didn't get some of their own back. The pictures of a drunk Katherine eating a Thorin goldfish were on the ComStar net in hours. Kat didn't care—she had a great time.

* * *

Despite a firecracker hangover, caused by ingesting the alcohol-inferno fluid mixture known as a fusionnaire, Kat was still early at the throne room the next morning. Kat had to get there first, to catch her sister out late. That was the thing she had set her heart on.

Sure enough, Yvonne was late—a full eighteen minutes behind her time. Kat stood with the door wide open that she might see her come into the office. Yvonne stripped out of her winter clothes faster than a Solaris stripper seeing a hundred dollar bill, and was on her stool in a jot, tapping away on her computer keyboard like she was on crack.

"Hey," hissed Kat in her accustomed voice. "What do you mean by coming here at this time of day?"

Yvonne cringed. "I'm sorry, Your Highnessness. I'm a little late."

"You are? Yes, I think so! Get over here!"

Yvonne dragged herself off her stool. "It's only once a year, sister. It won't be repeated. I was getting pretty merry yesterday, ma'am."

"Hmpf. I'll tell you what, dear sister, I am not going to stand this sort of thing any longer. So therefore—" Kat said, stalking forward, "I'm going to raise your salary."

It took Yvonne a moment. "You, uh…"

Suddenly Kat gave Yvonne a big hug. "A Merry Christmas, Yve!" said Kat with an earnestness that could not be mistaken. "A merrier Christmas, Yvonne, my dear sister, than I have given you for many a year. I'll raise your salary, and we'll discuss your status this very afternoon, over a Christmas bowl of punch. Turn up the thermostat until the 'Mechs' paint starts to blister before you so much as dot another 'I', Yvonne. Hell, I'll even be nice to Victor!"

Kat was better than her word. She did it all, and infintely more. She raised Yvonne's salary, who did not die, and even made her the Princess of the Federated Commonwealth. She spoke civilly to Victor and even to Omi, and was as good a woman as the good old city knew, or any other good old city, town, or borough in the good old world or in the good old Inner Sphere or the good old Sagittarius Arm or the…well, you get the idea. Some people laughed to see the alteration in her, but her own heart laughed, and that was quite good enough for her…

…until Victor and Omi kicked her headfirst out of the New Years' Eve party that Kat invited herself to. At that point, Kat swore eternal revenge, tried to kill Omi, we got click-tech, and the rest is history.

What, you expected a happy ending? Bah, humbug.


End file.
